


Emptyness

by booksarefriends



Category: Guardians of the Galaxy (Movies), Iron Man (Movies), Marvel, Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Emotions, F/M, Feelings, Hurt Tony, Mantis - Freeform, Other, Pain, Tony Feels, Tony Stark Feels, Tony Stark Has A Heart, Tony Stark Has Issues, Tony Stark Needs a Hug
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-23
Updated: 2019-05-23
Packaged: 2020-03-13 06:03:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,369
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18934912
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/booksarefriends/pseuds/booksarefriends
Summary: Mantis could feel Tony's pain through the entire room. It seemed to be all he consisted of.So when Mantis touched him, she couldn't be more surprised.





	Emptyness

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Ever_Whovian](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ever_Whovian/gifts).
  * Inspired by [Tumblr Thread](https://archiveofourown.org/external_works/484390) by itsallavengers. 



Emotions were complicated.

Especially Human Emotions. Humans were made of many emotions, very complex, and a lot of them at once.

Most of the times Mantis felt everything all at once when she touched a human. There was pain, love anxiety and most of the time she couldn’t control them. And they were never the same.

Mantis learned that human emotions exist in degrees, not in categories.  
There wasn’t a single feeling for anger, or a single feeling for sadness. There were degrees of anger. Anger felt like an explosion behind her eyes. Her ears were tingling first. Then there was the feeling of blood in her throat, blood she couldn’t swallow because it didn’t exist. But there also was sad anger. Sadness laid heavy on her, her chest would feel tight and her eyes would start burning and her throat would protest, and she couldn’t speak. Anger could come with hate, with love, and pain too.

But then there was pain.  
Real Pain felt like dying most of the times. It was drowning out most of the other feelings. If someone was feeling pain, there was also fear, and sadness. But pain was all consuming.

When Mantis touched Tony for the first time she wasn’t prepared.

She knew that touching Tony would hurt. She could sense the pain from distance, most of the time she couldn’t even stand to be in the same room as him. His pain was everywhere, it should be everywhere. It was consuming everything. After all she heard it was a miracle, he was still alive. She couldn’t even imagine what touching him must be like, what feeling what he was feeling, would _do_ to her.

She kept her distance.  
She knew, that she made the others uneasy with being able to tell what they can feel. She never touched someone without their consent. But Tony was different. She didn’t have to touch him to feel his pain. She could see it in every move, every smile every word.  
She wondered how the others could be so oblivious.

When she touched him, she was caught by surprise.

It was an accident that she even touched his hand, he was just handing her a glass of orange juice, and she had been so careful not to touch him. But his fingers brushed against hers and the glass shattered when it collided with the floor.

One moment Mantis was in the kitchen and next she was gone.

There was just _nothing_. The pain he radiated was gone – he was just _empty_. Mantis couldn’t understand. She couldn’t breathe for all that mattered either. There was just nothing. No Pain, no feelings, no hope. He was dead – Mantis was sure of it. He couldn’t be alive if he was feeling absolutely nothing, could he? Mantis still couldn’t breathe – if she couldn’t breathe, how could Tony? The emptiness sat heavy on her chest she could _feel_ it. The emptiness hurted her physically.

Finally, the feeling of Tony’s touch wore of. She could breath, she could feel and helplessly she stumbles backwards. How is he still alive?  
She didn’t know that she spoke these words out loud, but Tony Stark just smiled at her “Entirely out of spite.”

But Mantis knows. Mantis knows, that Tony Stark became so detached from his feelings, _his pain_ , that there was just nothing left for him feel. That there was nothing left of him at all. He just works and works and goes on because that allows him to just feel nothing, because if he wouldn’t work it would mean he would feel.

Mantis really didn’t want to touch him when he _was_ feeling.

* * *

 

She didn’t for a long time.

* * *

 

But one night she found him sitting in his lab alone and trembling and visible in pain. She was restless that night, as if she knew she was needed. As if his feelings reached her all the way down the building.

Tony didn’t move when Mantis entered the room, he didn’t even react. But his eyes moved so quick from side to side and his breath was fast and heavy and Mantis knew he was drunk.

Normally Mantis thought Tony was tall. She knew he was as tall as herself, or maybe even a tiny bit smaller, but he held himself so tall and confident he seemed to be at least as tall as Thor. He radiates confidence and calmness but beyond all that Mantis felt the pain. And she was the only one. But right now? He looked like a little kid.

She really didn’t want to touch him.

He looked so small and lost. And she couldn’t resist, she knew she should. Her hand snapped forward, and Tony suddenly saw her, tried to keep her from touching her. But he was too late. And when she touched him, she couldn’t breathe again. It wasn’t the absent of feeling that suffocated her this time. This time she was **_drowning_**.

There was just nothing else, she wasn’t there anymore, there were just all his feelings. And they were unbearable.

It hurt. Oh, it _really hurt_.

It’s not only **_pain_** , although the pain and _**loss** _and _**heartbreak** _does hurt. But the **_loneliness_** , the loneliness is what really breaks here first. Together with the **_disgust_ **and the _**loathing**_. There is the sharp sting of **_self-hatred_**. The feeling of deserving this – deserving the pain. That every betrayal, that feels like a twist in her gut, was exactly what he needed, he deserves. There is fear, fear of trusting someone – anyone- and the constant exhausting feeling of an upcoming threat. Fear that is on the edge of shifting into a panic attack. There is panic and restlessness deep down in this swirl of feelings.

Attached to these feelings is shame.  
So much shame at weakness and helplessness he feels. Mantis wants to rip the shame out. She wants to dig her fingers in the shame and claw it out, but she can’t, _she can’t_. And she feels sick, the disgust settles down deep in her, the disgust for herself – why is she even trying? The disgust burns in her – burns down her throat, mixing with acid in her stomach.

She doesn’t think it could get worse.  
But then there is guilt. Guilt is what really breaks her – it burns deep down like the disgust but it’s _so much worse_. It burns inside her ribcage and she can’t breathe anymore, there is no place to fill her lungs because it all just burns. The guilt says, it’s not enough. The pain is not enough – he deserves so much more pain. The guilt is what really makes her sick. She feels the nausea rising in her stomach and she feels so lost. The emptiness was bearable – this was torture.

Finally, she can let go of him – or someone made her let go of him, she really can't tell. There are red marks on his arm, where she touched him – she can see that clearly. And she is shaking and feeling nausea. When exactly did the room start to spin? Could rooms on earth even do that?

“I’m sorry”, Tony whispers, “so sorry that you had to feel that.”  
She cries, Mantis realised when Tony whipped away a tear. Why isn’t he crying too? She cried for both of them. It still hurts.  
“No”, she whispers, “I am so sorry.”

"It's alright, you are okay, I'm alright", Tony whisperd and gently pulled her to his chest. Carefully, not letting her touch him again, "You are okay. We both are"  
They were sitting on the floor, Mantis realised. How did they get on the floor? How could he comfort her, when there was this pain inside of him? How was he alive?  
"You are not okay", Mantis managed to say. 

For a moment there was just silence and Mantis closed her eyes. It was exhausting to feel so much - to hurt this much. But Tony kept her close, and his warmth comforted her- slowly drifting into sleep. Mantis couldn't tell if he was hugging her because she needed it, or because he needed it so much more. It didn't really matter.

"No", Tony admitted, "I'm not okay."

 

Mantis didn’t touch Tony again.


End file.
